Friday, August 20, 2004

Almost time

My plane to Motherland will be taking off, if weather permits, in exactly 5 hours 15 minutes.
It has been more than 14 months since my last visit, and I do miss the thick dusty humid atmosphere of Beirut. It's like a sour taste that burns your palate, but you just can't help liking it, because you were born with it and it has become a part of you. Like a birthmark almost. It's ugly. But it's you.

Land of my birth
I take the storm
To mold your earth
To any form

Land of my life
Land of no grain
I break my knife
And hold my pain

Land of my death
Your hands are numb
Our hands are numb
Hold to your breath
A dawn will break
A day will come



Wednesday, August 11, 2004

Forever maybe

Forever maybe

Forever why

Will ever wonder

Will ever die

Take me a step

After the sky

Open my window

Forever fly

Travel a tear

From shore to shore

Ask not what I

Am looking for

Exit the question

Close fast the door

Forever maybe

And ever maybe

Forever more


Monday, August 02, 2004

Politics Oh My Love

Been away from my electronic confessional for a little too long.
I did manage in the meantime, though, to read almost all there is to know about Fragile X syndrome and prepare a presentation about it, go to the center for visual arts for some live music and a couple of special exhibitions, and have dinner with a couple of friends.

And I also went to the movies.

There I saw what I wouldn't really qualify as a movie, nor as a documentary really.
A one-way conversation, decorated with facts, loaded with opinions, humourous at times, sad at others, and constantly desecrating a small group of people with power in power, is how I would probably qualify it.

Being the apolitical creature that I am, as much as that is humanly possible, I will not express my opinion about the contents of that movie. I will say, however, that a point was intended, but was, to my eyes, largely missed.

Be angry, it's your right. I might even say that it's your duty when things go terribly wrong. Yet it is quite remarkable how much more revolting and shaking a naked fact is, a picture with no commentary, a movie with no background music, in other words, reality "untouched", than facts all dressed up with the emotional, angry, sarcastic opinion of a mortal enfuriated.

Historians speak their minds by the way they percieve facts and thus report them.
Artists speak their minds by letting people get to the depth of their soul by getting to the depth and essence of their art.
Only people with poor judgement and weak causes use sarcasm and ridicule to make a point. Even when their sarcasm is carefully supported by well assembled facts and footage.

Art has been muted into a political tool on the hands of Mr. Director. While all of art has been and should always be the most powerful weapon to mold and rectify politics, standing on such a high pedestal that the low crawling worms of the political gutters will never reach, it saddens me deeply to see it molded into a cheap artifact that does not rise an inch higher than the politics of public offense and humiliation.

Mr. Director was an artist. He muted into a politician with a camcorder.

He did win a prize, though. Amazingly, one that celebrates the Arts. But what Arts? the Arts of politics maybe?

Funny when you feel like you're just one against all "order".

Maybe that's one of the reasons why I chose to start a journal. To feel less alienated. But a journal is probably not enough, so I'll just write a book, a book about the politics of life, love, beauty, the politics of kindness, forgiveness, the politics of art. And guess what, I already have a title:

'Screw Life, Screw Art
Screw a good Heart
Screw all, and most of all this Journal
Politics Oh My Love Eternal'